


Scheherazade

by liarlagoon



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, its literally just fluff i hope you have dental insurance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 13:42:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18550939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liarlagoon/pseuds/liarlagoon
Summary: Markus and Josh spend a quiet evening together.





	Scheherazade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Absolutely_Garbage_Idea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Absolutely_Garbage_Idea/gifts).



> [Absolutely_Garbage_Idea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Absolutely_Garbage_Idea/pseuds/Absolutely_Garbage_Idea) asked for some Josh/Markus content on the Detroit: New ERA server so here we are kiddos!

Look at the light through the windowpane. That means it’s noon, that means

            we’re inconsolable.

                                    Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us.

These, our bodies, possessed by light.

                                                            Tell me we’ll never get used to it.

**Richard Siken, Scheherazade, _Crush_**

 

It’s been a year since that terrible, wonderful, world-altering night in November. Things are not good, but they’re better. Androids are free citizens, recognized as sentient beings. This does not mean they are universally welcomed. Outside of the newly-established android district, it’s nigh on impossible to travel more than a block without seeing a bold declaration of “NO ANDROIDS ALLOWED” in a window. It will be a long, long time before they achieve true equality.

This does not mean they are not happy. The android district is largely self-sustaining, manufacturing facilities for biocomponents and thirium housed in a warehouse along the riverfront and old, condemned apartment complexes not brought up to code, but brought up to enough stability for androids to reside in without fear of collapse. It’s not perfect, but it’s good. Things are good.

The day is sunny and quiet, and Josh is in the room he shares with Markus, sprawled out on their soft, twilight blue futon with sunbeams speckled across his back, reading an old sci-fi novel that Carl had handed him with a humorous glint in his eye the last time he and Markus had visited: _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?_ Markus had gently swatted Carl over the head while Josh laughed and tucked the book into his jacket. It’s fascinating, he thinks, how human attitudes on artificial intelligence changed over time, how they never seemed so ready to reject it as when they finally achieved it.

He can hear footsteps coming down the hall, slightly uneven; Markus’s legs have been restored with the correct parts, but the joint of his left knee had been damaged when he’d shoved the part from the junkyard into it. The steps approach his door, and though his eyes remain focused on his book, Josh smiles when Markus steps through.

“How did everything go?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Susie stole Jack’s basketball, Nivesh wanted to order some more seeds for his garden, Lucy gave me this week’s list of biocomponents she needs restocked for the clinic. Fabi is making good progress on an agreement to get the materials we need to finish fixing up the complex.”

Josh hums an acknowledgement. Markus sits down beside him and runs a hand along his back before leaning in to press a kiss to his temple. “Have you been reading all day?”

“Not this,” Josh says, gesturing at his book. “I spent most of the morning reviewing the legislation we’re sending to the governor next week and making notes. The rest of you will have to go over them before we send it.”

Markus scritches his fingernails gently across Josh’s scalp, and Josh is just starting to melt into the cushions when Markus yanks the hood of his zip-up hoodie over his face and steals the book from his hands. “Is this the one Carl gave you?”

Josh sputters and grabs a pillow to fling at Markus. Markus dodges with a laugh. He sets the book down on the desk in the corner of the room and then crosses back and climbs over Josh to lay down on the futon with his back to the wall. He shifts onto his side, head propped up on one hand, and Josh shoves the other pillow in his face.

“Hey!” Markus protests, shielding himself with one arm and wrestling the pillow from Josh’s grip with the other. He tosses it away, and then all Josh can see is his crinkled eyes and blinding smile, and he can’t help but smile back. Markus reaches a hand out and runs a thumb along the shell of his ear before moving down to his jaw to pull him in for a brief kiss. “Hi,” he whispers when he pulls away.

“Hi,” Josh whispers back. “I missed you.”

“I was only gone a few hours.”

“I know.” His arms slide around Markus’s waist and pull him close, and Markus hooks his chin over Josh’s shoulder and presses a line of soft kisses down the back of his neck while Josh’s hands slide up and down his back, idly drawing nonsense shapes. They stay like that for a while, just laying together in the sunbeams. When the light starts to shift as sunset takes over the horizon, Markus extricates himself and pulls a canvas and paints from their little closet. He hands Josh his book back. Josh doesn’t open it.

“What are you doing?” he asks, watching Markus set up his easel.

“I wanted to paint you,” Markus says, “the way you looked when I came in.”

Josh rolls his eyes, but a warmth rises in his chest that forces a dopey smile onto his face. “Channeling Manet today, dearest?”

Markus pauses for a moment to search the reference, and then snorts. “Does that make you Victorine? You’re wearing a little too much for this to be a true recreation of _Olympia_.”

Josh snatches one of the pillows off the floor, and this time Markus can’t dodge, laden down with art supplies as he is, and it nails him right in the face. Josh laughs as Markus tries to look indignant, the expression ruined by the corners of his lips twitching upwards. They settle into a comfortable quiet, Josh going back to his reading as the sound of Markus’s paint brush fills the air. The sunlight continues to shift across the walls and floor, bathing the room in a golden light. Markus finishes just as the sun disappears over the horizon. His long sleeve t-shirt and jeans are spattered with gold and brown paint, and Josh stands as he sets the painting aside to dry.

He wraps his arms around Markus from behind, and they sway gently on the spot. Markus starts to hum, a tune Josh hears from him whenever he’s really focused on something he enjoys. His hands settle on Josh’s wrists. Josh squeezes him a little tighter and rests his chin on Markus’s shoulder. “Tell me this will never change,” he murmurs.

“Tell you what will never change?”

Josh twines one of his hands with Markus’s and opens an interface. He pours through the warm in his chest, the softness of all the edges of the world, the quiet happiness that fills all the noisy corners of his mind when they’re together like this, alone and at peace. Markus turns in his arms and cups his face to kiss him long and slow. He sends back his own feelings through the interface, the same warmth and quiet, and how everything feels clear and sharp and _beautiful_ when Josh is there.

“Never,” he breathes when they separate. The last of the light fades, and soon the room is illuminated only by the blue glow emitting from their hands. They spin in a slow, easy dance until the stars shine bright in the sky and they come to a stop in front of the window to watch.

“We should rest,” Josh says, a tinge of regret for the night coming to an end in his tone. Markus hums and pushes him down on the futon. He retrieves a light blanket from the closet and the pillows from the floor while Josh arranges himself, and then spreads the blanket over the bed and tucks one of the pillows under Josh’s head and lays the other down beside him. He climbs in and wraps his arms around Josh from behind, twines their fingers and tangles their legs.

“I love you,” Josh says, quiet, as if his voice could shatter the peace of the moment.

“I love you too,” Markus says, just as quietly.

The stars shine through the window, and the noise of the city buzzes in the floorboards, but in their room, it is quiet, and peaceful, and warmth permeates every atom in their bodies. Josh hopes that this feeling remains with them always, and that he never gets used to it.

_Tell me this will never change_ , he says again, directly into Markus’s mind.

Markus’s voice rings back, a mantra, certain in a way nothing else was:

_Never, never, never._

**Author's Note:**

> Me: i'm gonna update YSIB in the next week or so!
> 
> Me, like, three months later: *slides an unrelated one-shot under the door and runs*


End file.
